I was around for the 1990s tech bubble and the most shocking deal I remember from that time period was when Mark Cuban sold what was basically just a domain name, Broadcast.com, along with some recording equipment he had at home, for $5.7 billion to Yahoo in April of 1999!
At the time, I was moving my company, Stockhouse.com, which was the top financial website in many countries across the world then, towards a Nasdaq listing and we had just rented out the office across the street from the New York Stock Exchange for some extravagant sum, like $1 million/month.
We were preparing to raise $300 million, though, and become essentially an online version of CNBC in what was called “broadband” then. We even hired away one of CNBC’s top producers, who turned out to be the worst employee I’ve ever had and after three months, we ended up paying him out some obscene sum just so he’d leave.
Well, a year went by and the tech bubble burst so I ended up selling the company for peanuts. I looked back on Cuban’s deal and thought two things. Wow, his timing for the sale was perfect, getting out before the tech bubble popped.
And, secondly, he must have been the luckiest guy in the world or, more likely, had participated in some sort of collusion with some directors in Yahoo to manage to sell what was basically nothing for over $5 billion!
It was literally worse than most ICOs these days… it was simply a web address and some cheap recording equipment lying around Mark’s house! And, Yahoo never even did anything with it… at all. In fact, if you go to Broadcast.com today, it just forwards to Yahoo.com.
This was easily the most expensive domain name sale ever!
Since then, the bumbling Frankenstein look-alike has gone on to buy a basketball team with his fortune and be featured in a few reality shows where he seems to seek constant attention.
So, when he came out this week and made a fool of himself, I had to laugh.
“I hate gold. Gold is a religion,” said crony-capitalist Mark Cuban in a recent interview, adding that he views cryptocurrencies as simply “collectibles.”
Mark clearly knows nothing about money or investments if he thinks gold is just a “religion” and cryptocurrencies are just “collectibles.”
In fact, if he had invested his profits from the ludicrous sale of his domain name into gold and then bitcoin he’d be the wealthiest person on Earth. Let’s do the math.
He owned approximately ⅓ of Broadcast.com when it sold for $5.7 billion, netting him $1.8 billion in 1999. According to Forbes, as of January 2018, he is now worth $3.8 billion, meaning he has averaged a 4% annual increase.
If, in 1999, he had put his $1.8 billion into gold, which was trading at $290, and just kept it there until now at $1,350, he’d be worth over $6.5 billion. Or, more than double what he is currently worth.
And, if he had taken his gold holdings and put it into bitcoin in, say 2011, when we recommended bitcoin at $3, he’d have made a gain of over 230,000% and his $1.8 billion, which would have been over $5 billion by investing in gold, would then be worth $12 trillion, easily making him the wealthiest man in the world… well, except for the Rothschilds and the secret banking families.
Of course, he couldn’t have possibly purchased that much bitcoin at that price as it simply didn’t exist at the time.
But, if he had just picked up some gold and bitcoin along the way, he’d certainly be worth much, much more than he is today.
Thus, he really hates gold.
“Hate is not strong enough,” Cuban said, “Hate with extreme prejudice… hate with extreme prejudice is not enough, hate with double extreme prejudice with an ounce of hot sauce.”
No wonder he’s so angry. He wasted most of his wealth trying to be a reality TV star and purchasing a company of guys who chase each other around bouncing a ball and throwing it in a basket to lull the enslaved masses into a beer-infused stupor.
Simultaneously, though, Cuban endorses both the corrupted, top-down education system and the centrally planned, fiat dollar-based fractional reserve banking system that is responsible for at least one major financial crisis each decade and impoverishes everyone except the rich… like him.
Precious metals and cryptocurrencies happen to be the free market solutions to a collapsing dollar system, empowering people everywhere to survive and thrive, but Shark Cuban hates them.
The fiat system of debt is a house of cards supporting his favorite religion, the State. Now there’s something to hate.
Religion may have been first, but the State has become the most dangerous religion, robbing millions and killing countless in endless wars for oil and power.
The reason gold is preferred by people who care about freedom is because a gold standard handcuffs the State. It restricted politicians from overspending on rackets like “national defense” and it prevented government from rapidly building up the "public debt."
As Alan Greenspan put it, a gold standard checks the welfare state. That's probably why Cuban hates gold.
Actually, it makes perfect sense why this clown would love the State: he regularly uses it to protect his corporate patents.
Ironically though, it’s another case of “do as I say, not as I do,” because Mark also claims to despise the patent system.
As IP Watchdog detailed:
“Cuban has an outsized influence in this patent debate, and is walking both sides of the aisle. He has personally invested hundreds of thousands of dollars into the fight to stop what he characterizes as stupid patents, and he has invested millions into a business that only has those same stupid patents as the main asset.”
IP Watchdog goes on to describe how Cuban raised his “personal financial stake in a non-practicing entity” that also just so happened to be suing Google over a patent claim.
How convenient…
This kind of hypocrisy and doublespeak has become expected from the guy who announced in January that his sports team will begin accepting bitcoin payments “next season.”
Instead of worshipping at the altar of the State for so many years and telling his followers “the most patriotic thing” a person can do is “Pay your taxes. Lots of taxes,” Cuban should’ve read TDV (subscribe HERE), where we’ve helped thousands of people capitalize massively on gold and crypto.
But who needs to be a wise or savvy investor when you can just use the guns of your government god to impose your will on others?
Sorry Mark (not sorry), but the religion of the State is collapsing while assets like precious metals and cryptocurrencies are helping usher in this new era faster than your goons can regulate.
How ‘bout them Mavs though?
